


Torushina

by Lazuliblur



Series: Torushina [6]
Category: Tenkuu no Escaflowne | The Vision of Escaflowne
Genre: All criticism welcome, Canon Compliant, F/M, Gen, Slow To Update, and i do mean slow, basically an "okay but where was Celena during all that crazy nonsense" fic, generous use of worldbuilding privileges, movie verse, plus mentions of assorted others
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-05 14:20:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17920454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lazuliblur/pseuds/Lazuliblur
Summary: As Gaea recovers from the wounds that Folken dealt, so does its people. Celena Schezar is no exception.





	Torushina

**Author's Note:**

> This story is a massive rewrite of an incomplete old fic of mine, still available at FF.net. As I recently tried to finish it, I kept coming across Things That I Would Have Done Differently Today and it was really annoying. I just wanted to put a COMPLETE stamp on it and the muses wouldn't let me, you know? Thus, this fic was born. As far as the two versions are concerned, this rewrite is a sequel of the old version that will eventually incorporate all events covered in that timeframe. Reading the old version is neither necessary nor recommended, lol.
> 
> Although this fic was spurred on by annoyance, I am having a great time writing it. My hope is that some of that fun will find its way to you, readers. Enjoy! ;)

In the year since the end of Folken's domain, the Abaharaki had settled in Torushina to form a provisional government. The city-state needed leadership, but they were reluctant to let anybody, even Princess Millerna, rule alone the way that Folken had. As owner of the stateliest-looking building to have survived Escaflowne's rampage, Dryden had volunteered his house to headquarter the new institution. Allen's distaste of the man was great, but not enough to justify refusing the offer. He had given in to the idea and Dryden had lovingly set aside the smallest room on the second most upper floor for him.

The office was usually abuzz with activity. Discussions about the future of the city were never quiet and the noise from the bar downstairs only added to the chaos. Dryden's precious vase collection occupied most available flat surfaces. It did not combine well with the number of people that called throughout the day and Allen had no issues being vocal about how the collateral damage to the property was the silver lining of the whole arrangement. Given the questionable means by which Dryden had acquired his collections, Celena agreed, but a chip broke off her heart every time another piece of Gaean history was damaged.

Today, Allen's office was quiet. No one except Celena was in.

At some point, Allen had decided that the best strategy to avoid guests was to make the room as uninviting as possible. The window stayed open in the winter and closed in the summer, while a single storage box doubled as a guest seat. There, Celena sat straight-backed, playing with a loose thread on her shirtsleeve. To keep anxious thoughts under check, she examined the black-and-blue contours painted on the nearest vase. It featured an artistic rendering of an ancient map of Gaea, mythical beasts included. Serpents formed the ocean's currents and jutting dragon's teeth accounted for the mountain ranges surrounding the Great Continent.

Company finally came in the form of Allen. He entered with enough force to cause the door to rebound off the wall and snap back shut. In the heartbeat that it took him to stalk up to the desk, Celena took a discreet steadying breath. The confrontation to follow would put her to the test.

She braved the silence first, gentle and meek, hoping to set the mood.

"Allen, what's going on? Dryden brought me here and left without another word."

Allen found himself a place to rest between the desk and Celena. There was a fire in his blue eyes that she knew well. She had seen it before in her father's face and often in the mirror. It was the first time that she experienced it from Allen with this level of intensity though. The disappointment in it, too, Celena had expected.

"Celena, you are my sister and I love you. I would do anything to protect you. You know this." That the loving words came from behind clenched teeth did not shake Celena's trust in their honesty. "So right now I need you to tell me everything: what have you done?"

Her eyebrows wrinkled in a delicate frown and her head tilted in a well-practiced angle.

"What do you mean, Allen?"

Her faux confusion earned her no sympathy. Allen knew her as well as she knew him. He pressed the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger.

"Don't play games with me, Celena! Now is not the time! Just tell me the truth!"

"I… I don't know what to say. I don't know what you are talking about!"

Another bang! resounded in the closed office space as Allen punched the desk. An innocent pile of documents tumbled down to the floor. Celena bent to pick them up but aborted the movement as soon as her eyes met Allen's.

She reminded herself to stay calm. Allen knew nothing for certain. She hoped.

"Allen, I don't—"

"For the love of our parents, for the sake of everything dear in this world, I beg you, Celena! Do not lie to me. Please! Where were you this afternoon?"

"With you," Celena answered, aware of what a lame attempt at evasion it was.

"Don't play me for a fool. No games, Celena, not this time. This is serious. Where were you?"

She looked down at her lap and the frayed sleeve that her worrying fingers had made worse.

"I—I was at home. I was at home and then Millerna came to see me with your message, to meet you at the courthouse at the fourth hour. So I waited until then and then I came to see you."

Allen blew out a breath. Arms flying in exasperation, he walked to the door and back. The moment he was not looking, Celena let her innocent expression drop and reform in a stronger shape. Lying to Allen was more difficult than expected.

"Please tell me," Allen repeated, perching himself back on the desk an arm's length away. The rigidness in the set of his shoulders had doubled. Discomfort permeated the room. "You weren't at the prison this afternoon?" he asked.

"The prison? Why would I go there?"

"One of the guards saw someone that resembled you go in without proper authorisation. They had short hair and they were blonde."

 _Chesta!_ , Celena thought.

"What makes you think that was me? I'm not the only person with blond hair in this city." To prove her point, she gestured at him, but he brushed the argument aside without acknowledging it.

"Another guard confirmed that there have been frequent visits from an unknown woman with forged papers. She also matches your description. Care to explain?"

"Explain what?" Celena raised her voice, annoyed that a pair of ambiguous descriptions had been enough to make Allen doubt her. "How should I know who goes or doesn't go visit the prison? Why would you even think that was me?"

"Because…" Allen stopped himself before he could say more.

Celena cursed to herself, wondering how much he knew for sure of what she had done.

"Because?" she prodded.

"This past week… Where have you spent this past week, Celena? You were always leaving home in the morning and coming back late at night. Can you account for that?"

"You know where I've been. I told you! Why would I go to the prison? I don't know anybody there and the thought alone of the kind of people I'd find is frankly disturbing. I'd rather stay away."

"So if I were to summon that guard and ask if he recognised you…?"

A cold shiver pervaded her stomach, but Celena fought not to let her expression betray it. Instead, she shook her head with a quiet huff.

"If you must. But it would be a waste of time. I'm not even sure I know where the new place is." A beat. "Allen, I—I don't know what you expect me to say right now!"

"Just answer my question, Celena: where were you this past week?"

"At the University. Or what's left of it. Trying to save what I can of the old library and archives. That's all. Why would you think otherwise? What's the point of this interrogation?"

Allen once again ignored her own questions while continuing to demand more answers. It reminded Celena of how much she loved the hypocritical side of him.

"And I suppose that there's no one who can verify that you were actually there," he said. "You've been working alone, of course."

"Yes. Of course. And you know why, Allen. Whatever other scholars haven't fled the city are too busy looking after their families and rebuilding their homes — and I'll be damned if I let that Dryden and his grubby fingers near any more relics!"

Celena nodded at the vase that she had been examining earlier, a three-century-old piece left behind by the Gadarasarai. Priceless.

Allen hummed an agreement, his anger momentarily redirected. Allies they may be, but he had his own reasons for disliking Dryden.

"Like I'd let him be all alone with you," he muttered.

"There's no one else available or willing to do it. And all those books, all that knowledge, it's far too precious to be lost or forgotten. Father's research is all there. I want to save as much as I can. So, yes, Allen, that's where I've spent most of my time last week. In fact, that's where I've spent most of my time since returning to Torushina. Alone."

"Most?"

Celena shook her head again, ready to curse herself in all three of the dead languages she was fluent in. She had gained a little space for herself by presenting Dryden as an alternative target for Allen's wrath — womanisers were territorial — and now she had pushed herself two steps back because of a slip of the tongue.

"I help at the shelters in the mornings. I know you don't like me going to the refugee camps, but this is what I did before coming to Torushina and I'm not about to abandon my work with the volunteers just because you say that I can't any longer."

Allen crossed his arms and considered this for a moment. Celena could see a whole script of complaints unfolding and being discarded in the tiny flexes of his jaw. He would have loved to air them, she was sure, if only there were not more important issues at hand.

"You must take breaks while you're at the old university. Where do you go? What do you eat?" he asked.

"I take food from home or from the relief camp. I stay on the old campus and eat there to make the most of the time."

Allen pushed himself away from the desk and went around it to the small window at the back of the room. He leaned his hands against the wooden frame and looked outside.

"What's with all these questions, Allen?" Celena asked with the best tone of confusion she could produce. She figured that her best chance to get out of this was to appeal to the side of him that could not bear to see a woman in distress, especially his sister. "I don't understand! Why are you like this all of a sudden?"

The door opened before Allen could reply, breaking the spell Celena had tried to weave. Gaddes's head peeked in.

"Boss, Reeden picked up a trail! It looks like he's headed northeast."

"Well done," Allen said. "Go with Reeden. I'll catch up with you as soon as I can."

Gaddes nodded, then left, shutting the door behind him.

Out of all the rebels that travelled with Allen in the Abaharaki, Gaddes was the one that Celena felt closest to. He had slipped her sips of vino behind Allen's back and lent her a kind ear when her frustration with her brother's restrictions spilled over. Now, he had not even looked her way.

It stung. No matter how much Celena told herself that she had expected this to happen once she was exposed, that she had made peace with her choice and was prepared to face the consequences, it stung.

"Folken's Demon General escaped from prison today," Allen said. "Just before his execution. Someone helped him do it."

"What?" she exclaimed, eyes wide in an approximation of the horror such news should have caused her. "What are you doing here, then? You need to capture that monster as soon as possible!"

"We think that... Well, there's reason to suspect that…" Allen hesitated. Admitting this out loud pained him. "After the trial, when the guards were marching him off to prison, he mentioned you by name. So I need to know, Celena, how does he know you? Did you help him somehow? Whatever you did, we can fix it, if you tell me the truth."

Celena wished she had a good two hours to swear at Dilandau's vanity and Allen's overprotectiveness. If not for their big mouths and stupid pride, she would not be in this tight spot. As it was, taking any time at all to respond to Allen would only be seen as a sign of guilt.

"Why would I help Folken's troops? I don't know how this general knows my name, maybe he heard it from one of your men, I don't care. I've no love for the Black Dragon Clan, I would never help them! They invaded our home, they killed and destroyed and—"

"Please, Celena! Whatever you did, it's better that you tell me now. If the courts hear about this, if they suspect you of anything, they'll want to hang you too and I can't guarantee that—"

"No!" Celena shouted. "How can you say that? Do you really believe I'm a traitor? Me? That's absurd!"

"Celena, I've met the demon and I know how these things go. I know that he can be persuasive. And you being a beautiful young woman with a propensity for—"

The humiliation was too great to bear. Not only because it seemed Allen thought that she was without a functioning brain, but because he had come dangerously close to the truth.

"So now I'm — what? Not just a traitor, but dimwitted? Impressionable? You don't think my poor female heart knows the difference between basic right and wrong?" She paused. "How dare you? You might have dumped me in a bumpkin town in the middle of nowhere while you played the knight with your buddies, but don't think for a second that I don't hate the Black Dragon Clan as much as you! In fact, I'm sure I hate them more."

Now would be Allen's turn to be confronted with the Schezar's brand of fire. Celena's temper rivalled his when she wanted to.

"While you were off waving your sword and touring the countryside in search of mythical nonsense that for all we knew was fantasy, I spent every day in the real world, next to the Black Dragon's victims. And I can assure you that Folken's brutality was greater than ever when he wasn't in the mood for outright slaughter. Would you like to hear about his interrogation methods? Or perhaps you're curious about what his troops considered fun? What they did to children in front of their parents and what they did to the adults who didn't fall in line? As long as I live, brother, I will never forget the sight of those survivors or the emptiness in their voices as they told me their stories. So don't you dare assume that I have less reason than you to hate that tyrant!"

The outrage making Celena's blood boil felt good. This was the first unreservedly honest thing that she had said so far and the torrent toppled the walls of discomfort that had been closing in around her.

Allen looked away first.

"Gods, Celena… Why do you have to make everything harder than it needs to be?"

So he was still not convinced. He made his way to the door. There, he delivered his parting words from over his shoulder.

"I'm going to join the search with Gaddes and the others. This door will remain closed until I return."

Still riding her furious high, it took Celena a moment to realise what Allen's words meant. It was a moment too long.

"Wait, you're locking me here like a prisoner? You can't be serious! Allen!"

Allen ignored her protests. Before she had finished calling out his name, he was gone and the key had turned inside the lock. Indistinct mutterings came from the corridor outside. No doubt Allen telling a guard not to let anyone in or out of the room.

And suddenly she was alone again.

Celena stood gaping at the closed door for a full minute, burning a hole through the wood with her best Schezar-blue gaze. This was typical Allen, she thought, not trusting her to be able to look after herself or make her own decisions, isolating her, locking her up like a bird in a cage. Like it solved anything. He had done it when they were children and he was doing it now. The same was true of when he had left her alone among the refugees after the destruction of their home. And that time it had worked so well — she bore the scar on her cheek to prove it.

The more she thought about the pattern, the angrier she became — and when the negativity became too much to hold inside, she got up and paced. Thinking that fresh air might bring some relief, she opened the window.

Outside, sitting on a pile of rubble across the street, a young blond boy with an overgrown fringe smiled up at her.


End file.
